Twenty Links with Magna Carta

Everyone is interested in links with the past, and few Englishmen have had a stronger sense of the continuity of history than Winston Churchill, whose own long career reminds us of a day that now seems very remote. We all have traditions in our own families of some ancient relative who could recall a long-past event in history, but these pious stories rarely constitute an actual link.

My grandfather, for example, as a boy, saw Napoleon on the deck of the Bellerophon in Plymouth Sound, an interesting reflection but not quite real to me, since my grandfather died before I was born. In the case of Churchill, we can establish an actual working connection with one of his seniors, who was engaged in politics a hundred years ago.

When he first held office as Under-Secretary for the Colonies, in Campbell-Bannerman’s administration, his senior colleague in the Government was Lord Ripon, who had served as a young man under Palmerston. How much further can we go?